The Fires of Atlantis (Purge of Babylon, Book 4)

by Sam Sisavath

  She hadn’t counted on the girls showing up suddenly on the beach, though. If things did go bad and he grabbed one of them…

  Please, God, don’t let me be wrong about Keo.

  “If you were me, how would you do it?” she asked. “Delay the attack.”

  “You seemed to be awfully sure there’s going to be an attack.”

  “You saw it yourself. The staging area with the soldiers.”

  “But that’s not all. You have inside information.”

  That’s one way to put it, she thought, and said, “I know it’s coming, yes.”

  “Okay.” He seemed to think about her question for a moment. Then, “It’s been a whole day, so by now they would have gotten reinforcements. Men to replace the ones I took out yesterday. You’re looking at a dozen assaulters at least. Two, maybe three dozen, if you’re really SOL.”

  “What else?”

  “The fact that they’re willing to commit to assaulting the island at all, given how isolated you people are, tells me you’ve pissed either them or their ghoul masters off. I’m guessing that radio broadcast of yours had a little something to do with it.”

  She smiled. After Carrie and Lorelei mentioned he knew of her broadcast, she had been waiting for him to put two and two together. “Finally figured it out, huh?”

  He chuckled. “I know I look it, but I’m not that dense. But yeah, it took a while.”

  “What finally gave me away?”

  “Your voice sounds more echoey on the radio.”

  “I recorded it in the Tower. It’s an enclosed space.”

  “How’d you find out about the silver?”

  “Trial and error.”

  She sneaked a look at him. He was watching the girls frolicking against the waves. She couldn’t quite read his reaction. Maybe he was marveling at the sight…or was it complete indifference?

  I can’t read this man. I’m about to put the lives of everyone on this island into the hands of a stranger whose face I can’t read with any certainty.

  “Will you help us, Keo?”

  He looked over at the boats docked along the pier. One of them was a sailboat—small enough to be handled by one person, with a powerful outboard motor that would have had no problems taking him south and to the coast of Texas. The boat Carrie and Lorelei had come in sat among them, looking almost quaint next to the more travel-ready vessels.

  This is it. This is where he proves me right or wrong.

  She didn’t realize it, but her hand had moved closer toward her sidearm. She shifted her eyes slightly to the right and saw Blaine watching them closely, his rifle gripped in front of him at the ready.

  “And you’ll give me one of those boats, plus fuel and supplies?” he asked. “Everything I need to make it to the Texas coast?”

  “Yes,” she said, and hoped her voice wasn’t nearly as anxious as it had sounded to her own ears.

  She waited for his answer, but he surprised her by chuckling softly to himself.

  “What’s so funny?” she asked.

  “A year ago, you wouldn’t have liked me.” He was watching Elise and Vera building castles in the sand while Jenny, Sarah’s daughter, did backstrokes nearby. “In fact, you would have hated me, and justifiably so. I’ve done things you couldn’t imagine.”

  “I’m sure you had good reasons.”

  “No,” he said, and laughed, though it was devoid of humor. “Not really.”

  “You’ve changed. We all have. Adapt or perish.”

  “I’ve gone soft is really what’s happened.” He sighed. “The organization would have put me out of my misery months ago.”

  “‘Organization’?”

  “The people I used to work for.”

  “They don’t sound like very nice people.”

  “Nope. They were most definitely not.” He looked over at her. “I’m not promising anything, you understand? I’ll do what I can, but it might still not be enough. But maybe it’ll buy your boyfriend time to get back here and put up a proper defense.”

  “I’m willing to take that chance.”

  “First things first,” he said. “I’ll need guns, ammo, explosives, and at least one person to lend a hand. So, I asked you the question before, and I’ll ask it again: Are you really willing to put your life, and the lives of everyone on this island, into the hands of a stranger with a gun?”

  *

  Over the months, Danny had organized the subterranean space under the Tower into a makeshift armory. Lara had been surprised when she first saw it, but Danny had single-handedly done a magnificent job. He had halved the basement, with emergency supplies like rations, crates of MREs, cases of small bottled water and five-gallon coolers—half of them unopened, the other half refilled with tap water—and equipment up front. The back contained the weapons, ammo, and silver that hadn’t been melted down yet. There were green ammo cans filled with silver rounds stacked high in one corner and even more housed in regular moving boxes. The rest of the non-essentials, like clothes and personal items, had been transferred over to the hotel and put in a “lost and found room” in the back where anyone could take what they needed.

  As a result, the basement looked bigger than when she was last down here two months ago. The room was longer than it was wide, extending away from the northeast cliff. Lara had never measured the space, but she guessed it was ten yards at its widest and at least twenty at its longest. LED lights, powered by the solar cells around the island, lined the ceiling, with battery backups hanging from wall hooks.

  “When do you expect your boyfriend back?” Keo asked. He was standing in front of the racks of rifles. She couldn’t tell if he was impressed or indifferent by the selection Will and Danny had collected over the months.

  “Best-case scenario is later tonight,” Lara said. “Worst-case scenario is…God knows.”

  “So I’m a stopgap, is that it?”

  “You said it, not me.”

  His laugh echoed slightly in the contained room. “At least you’re honest about it.” He pulled an M16 from the rack. “You got rounds for the M203?”

  The M203 was the grenade launcher attached under the barrel of the rifle. It was the same type of weapon that had almost ended her life when Kate’s people last assaulted the island.

  She gestured at the crates around them. “Be my guest.”

  “I’ll also need my guns back.”

  “They’re in the hotel.”

  He nodded. “So. Where are my volunteers?”

  *

  Blaine and Bonnie had joined her and Keo on the third floor of the Tower. She expected to see Blaine there. He had volunteered almost as soon as she brought it up earlier, but Bonnie’s presence was a surprise.

  “How’s this going to work?” Blaine asked.

  Keo leaned against one of the windows, looking over his submachine gun. He looked overly well-armed with the addition of the M16. “I just need you to do the driving.”

  “What about me?” Bonnie asked.

  He shrugged. “I guess you’ll be there in case he gets shot.”

  Bonnie and Blaine exchanged a worried look.

  “Just you against that army out there?” Blaine said.

  “Don’t be so dramatic,” Keo said. “Even with reinforcements, it’s still a makeshift group of assholes in homemade uniforms. And besides, numbers isn’t going to play a part in this.”

  That didn’t seem to really reassure either Blaine or Bonnie, and Keo didn’t look like he cared too much about their reactions.

  “You guys don’t have to go,” Lara said. “I can ask for other volunteers.”

  “I’m good,” Blaine said without hesitation.

  “Me too,” Bonnie said, though not nearly as quickly. She scrutinized Keo across the room. “Tell me one thing: You’re not going there just to get yourself killed, right? You want to come back here?”

  “That’s a dumb question,” Keo said, looking almost offended by the mere suggestion. “I don’t have a death w
ish. I wouldn’t be doing this if I didn’t think I could walk away from it. I just wanted to make sure you know what you’re getting into, that’s all. People are going to die. Maybe the two of you will be among them. You need to understand the risks. But trust me when I tell you, I’m not going there to get killed. I got places to go and people to see.”

  That seemed to reassure them somewhat.

  “Last chance,” Lara said. “Speak up now—”

  “I’m good,” Blaine said again.

  “Yeah, me too,” Bonnie nodded, and this time she said it quicker and with more conviction.

  Lara wanted to tell them something reassuring, make a speech that would ease their minds. She tried to come up with words that Will would say to rally the troops as they prepared to go into battle.

  Instead, the only thing she could think of to do was glance down at her watch. “Let’s get something to eat before you guys go.”

  “Maddie’s relieving me in a few hours,” Blaine said.

  “Okay, I’ll send her over earlier.”

  If having someone in the Tower twenty-four hours a day was important before, it was imperative now. So she, Keo, and Bonnie walked down using the spiraling cast-iron staircase while Blaine stayed behind.

  Keo wandered ahead, and Lara used the moment to walk beside Bonnie.

  “I’m volunteering because I want to, Lara,” Bonnie said before Lara could ask the question that had been on her mind since she saw Bonnie waiting for them on the third floor.

  “Can I ask why?”

  “You don’t know?”

  “Should I?”

  “Because someone had to, or else you would have volunteered. And we couldn’t allow that.”

  “‘We’?”

  “Carly, me, Benny, Roy… Everyone.”

  The ‘we’ strikes again.

  This wasn’t the first time the island had made a decision for her because they believed it was for her own good. It was ironic because she was supposedly running the place in Will’s absence. And yet, whenever they felt like it, the others always got together and discussed what was best for her. She should have been angry about it, even pissed off, but she couldn’t, really, because they were almost always right.

  “One of us had to go with Blaine and Keo,” Bonnie continued. “Carly wanted to. So did Maddie. And Benny and Roy, and even Jo and Gwen. But in the end, we decided I was the best choice.”

  “Why you?”

  Bonnie laughed. “You sound so surprised.”

  “I…” Lara began, but didn’t finish because everything she would have said would have come out as an insult to Bonnie.

  “I know,” Bonnie said with a grin. “The ex-model? I don’t blame you. All I can say is, you have to trust me, because compared to the rest, I’m the best choice. I was always athletic as a kid. I played basketball when I was in high school and I’ve stayed pretty active over the years. It was either stay skinny by sweating your ass off or throw up everything you ate, and I was never good at chucking food.”

  Lara smiled.

  “So yeah, between everyone, I’m the obvious choice,” Bonnie said.

  “All of this, so I wouldn’t volunteer myself?”

  “Yes.” Bonnie gave her an earnest look. “You’re important to the island, Lara. More than the rest of us.”

  “I don’t know what to say, Bonnie.”

  And she didn’t. She had no idea whatsoever. Because Bonnie was right. She would have gone with Keo and Blaine if no one else had stepped forward. Keo had made it clear—he could have done with one, but he preferred two. Three people gave them the best chance at success, and right now, they needed success in the worse way until Will and Danny could come home.

  “Thank you,” Lara said. It was the only thing she could think of to say, and it felt too simple and unworthy of Bonnie’s sacrifice.

  She wondered if Bonnie had even heard her, though, because the other woman looked preoccupied with Keo, who was walking ahead of them. “You really think he’s as good as he thinks he is?” she asked.

  “From what Carrie and Lorelei told me, he’s pretty damn good,” Lara said.

  “And you think this could work?”

  “I hope this works.”

  “What happens after that? I know you just want to delay them for a few days until Will and Danny can get here. But what happens after that?”

  “I don’t know,” Lara said quietly. “I’m just trying to get us to tomorrow first…”

  CHAPTER 25

  GABY

  She should have killed the kid. Darren. Well, he wasn’t really a kid. He was older than her by a few years, but to Gaby, anyone with a rifle who couldn’t put up a fight was a kid. Of course, killing Darren went out the window as soon as he started crying. Even Claire had looked almost sickened by the sight of that.

  So they had left the collaborator on the side of the road and taken his truck. It was a Chevy Silverado, though one truck was the same as another to Gaby. It had a high perch, which allowed her to see a lot of the road up ahead, something that she liked. It was also powerful, and she finally understood why boys loved their trucks so much. It was hard not to feel as if you could run over just about anything behind the wheel of one of these monsters because, in all likelihood, you probably could. All she needed from it at the moment was to get her to Song Island.

  Donna and Milly were stuffing themselves with food and refilled bottles of water in the back. Claire, who sat shotgun in the front passenger seat, leaned over every now and then to grab some for herself. Each time she did, Gaby resisted the instinct to tell her to put on her seat belt. She had to keep reminding herself that she wasn’t the girl’s mom, though she felt a strange connection to her, even more so than to Milly, whom she had known longer.

  It was still morning, and the sun baked the empty vastness to both sides of them. The hot asphalt road shimmered and looked like water in front of her, and the nothingness made her feel like she was daydreaming. It should have made her comfortable and lulled her into something resembling serenity, but instead it only made her more alert and sit up straighter in the leather seat.

  It was Josh. She couldn’t stop thinking about him. About what he had become, what he was doing. She kept looking at her side mirror, expecting to see him coming up behind her at any moment, declaring his love for her, that he was doing all of this for her, while bringing along a small army of lackeys.

  Keep lying to yourself, Josh. Maybe one day you’ll actually believe it.

  “Is it far from here?” Claire asked after a while. She talked through a mouthful of bread and pieces of sausage.

  “Where’d you get that?” Gaby asked.

  “Back here,” Donna said, holding up a blue plastic Tupperware with more sausages inside. “It’s pork.”

  “How’s the bread?”

  “It’s about a day old. Still pretty good, though.”

  Donna pulled off a chunk and leaned forward. Gaby gobbled it up and chewed for a moment, keeping one hand on the steering wheel and her eyes outside the windshield the entire time. The last thing she needed was to run them into a ditch while trying to eat. All those “Don’t Text and Drive” commercials flashed through her mind all of a sudden. That and those “Click it or Ticket” billboards.

  The good old days…

  Donna was right. The bread was still pretty good. Then again, it had been a while since she had last eaten some. They had frozen dough on the island, but these actually tasted fresh. Or, at least, one-day fresh. Donna handed her one of the pork sausages and Gaby devoured that, too. It was even better when she stuffed the remaining parts into the bread and ate it like a hot dog.

  “They must have a pig farm or something,” Donna said. “And fresh flour.”

  Gaby nodded. She wondered how much Donna knew about what was happening out there, with the collaborators and the towns, while she was stuck in Dunbar all this time with her sister under Harrison’s protection. But she decided not to ask. The sisters knew enough to be s
cared of the soldiers and what was out there at night, and those were the only two things she needed them to know at the moment.

  “You know how to cook?” she asked Donna.

  Donna shrugged. “A little.”

  “She thinks she’s good, but she’s terrible at it,” Claire said.

  “At least I can cook,” Donna said.

  “Barely.”

  “Ugh, you’re never eating anything I cook again.”

  “Promise?”

  “You say that now—”

  “Look!” Milly shouted, leaning between the front seats and pointing not up the road, but to the right of the highway.

  Gaby took her foot off the gas slightly and the Chevy slowed down, going from forty to thirty, then twenty, as she saw what Milly was pointing at: a white two-story house being ravaged by a raging fire. The building was part of a farm, flanked by a red barn and some kind of storage shack. After leaving the cemetery behind, farmland and the houses of the people that tilled them had begun popping up.

  “Whoa,” Claire said, leaning against her door. She had rolled down the window and the girl stuck her head out a bit. “It’s really burning that sucker up.”

  They were almost past the house, and Gaby swore she could feel the flames all the way over here, adding to the already terrible morning heat. Donna and Milly moved toward the back right window to get a better look at the flames.

  “Should we stop?” Donna asked.

  “No,” Gaby said without hesitation.

  “What if someone needs help?” Milly said.

  “It’s too dangerous. After what happened with the soldiers, I don’t want to take any chances.”

  Gaby gave the house one last look, scanning the grounds around it. She couldn’t detect any signs of movements or vehicles in motion in the front yard or along the manmade dirt road that connected it to the highway.